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Saving lives

17 Dec

Will Norman Newham.

Will Norman addresses Newham councillors

Dr Will Norman, the mayor of London’s Walking and Cycling Commissioner, spoke to Newham council at their October meeting about the impact that policies to reduce traffic and improve air quality have had. This is the speech he gave, lightly edited to improve readability online*.

Thank you, Chair, and a massive thank you to the whole council for inviting me here the this evening. It’s a privilege to be here.

I’m going to start on a somber note. Last year, 110 people were killed on London streets through crashes and collisions. Over 3,500 people were seriously injured in the last three years. There have been 15 fatalities on Newham’s roads, and over 4,000 people have been hurt.

Now you, as councillors, will know the tragedy that that brings to people’s families, to their friends, to colleagues and to communities. These are violent, random deaths that bring misery to thousands of Londoners on an annual basis.

The good news is that those numbers are falling.

Last year was the lowest year on record outside the pandemic for fatalities and London’s number of collisions are falling four times faster than the national average. And I’m here today to say thank you to everybody in this room for playing your role. Your rollout of a 20 mph limit across the borough has had an incredible impact.

We’ve done some research now looking at the impact that council decisions have made on the on the lives of Londoners.

We saw a 40% fall in fatalities thanks to your policies.

We saw 34% fall in the number of people being seriously injured thanks to your 20 miles an hour policies.

Astonishingly, we saw a 75% fall in the number of kids being killed on London’s roads due to your 20 miles an hour policies.

And there’s a huge amount of evidence of the benefits that these are bringing. They are not having an impact on journey times. They’re having an impact on air quality. They are saving lives, due to all your hard work.

There are literally people walking around Newham today who wouldn’t have been, had it not been for the efforts of everybody in this chamber.
It’s not just the 20 miles an hour that’s having an impact. If you look at your fantastic healthy street schools programme, it’s another success.

And I’d like to congratulate everybody in the room for their work on this too. 51 of your 127 schools have got us got a school streets program.

The evidence shows that you’ve seen a significant fall in the volume of traffic. The feedback from people within Newham means that it’s they feel safer and calmer to walk their school or their kids to school across the whole capital. Because of your hard work, we’ve beaten our target of 58% of kids to walk to school on a daily basis – which far exceeds the national targets – and it far exceeded our expectations. So we’ve had to set a new target because of all your good work.

But it’s not just that kids are safer going to school on their way to school and their way back. It’s having an impact in their schools.
I don’t know if any of you have ever seen a child have an asthma attack. It is genuinely terrifying seeing a small child struggling to breathe, to struggle to get air.

Our air quality contributes to that on a daily basis. So we put air quality monitors inside some of the schools around London to look at the impact.

SchoolStreets Cuts Pollution.

I’ll show you the benefits that your policies are having on children with these with the in these schools. The graph there shows that there is obviously an improvement in air quality at drop off time and pick up time. Now that would make sense, because that’s when the school streets in operation. But the genuine change that that graph shows is that air quality throughout the entire school day is better, not just a drop off time, not just a pick up time.

That means that every school, every kid in those 51 schools across Newham is breathing in cleaner air the whole time they are at school.

So again, thank you, that is also contributing to the change in air quality across London. That means fewer asthma attacks and all the problems associated with that across the city.

When we started this journey, I think we were told it would take 194 years to make London’s air legal. Can you believe that almost 200 years to make London’s air legal?

Collectively, thanks to the work in this of everyone in this room and at Transport for London and the mayor and all the other boroughs, we’ve done that in nine.

So thank you. You are saving lives on that. But it’s not just road safety, it’s not just air quality. The health benefits of the policies that you’re implementing are having an astonishing impact.

I was talking to Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer for the UK, the other day. He said that active travel is having more of an impact than anything else on the outcomes and inequalities in health.

Last week, I was out with the Mayor and Councillor Morris to open the new bike lanes and transformation of the North Woolwich corridor. We heard from secondary school kids who were walking to school safely. We saw cyclists moving along there safely, and that is contributing to a huge boost in cycling across London.

You collectively in this room, are making kids healthier. You’re stopping those asthma attacks, you’re reducing heart disease, you’re reducing diabetes, you’re reducing cancer, you’re reducing depression, you are contributing to a healthier London, a healthier Newham, and everybody is benefiting from that.

So I remind you again, as a consequence of your hard work, there are people walking around this borough today, right now, this evening, who wouldn’t have been had it not been for the policies you’ve implemented. So I want to say, on behalf of the Mayor of London and on behalf of the residents of London, thank you.

Keep up the good work.

We’ll keep supporting you, but the impact that you are making is genuinely astonishing, and you should be proud of it.

The long and short of it is that policies that discourage unnecessary car journeys and encourage active travel SAVE LIVES. Better air quality means better health. Fewer cars on the road means fewer collisions, fewer injuries, fewer deaths. 

In next year’s elections some candidates will stand on a platform of rolling these policies back. They will claim to be speaking for residents, for ‘the people’. But evidence shows that doing so – cancelling healthy school streets, rolling back people friendly streets, reverting to a 30 MPH speed limit – will cost lives. People who are walking around our borough today won’t be in a year or two if we step back into the past.

Please, think carefully before you vote.

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Election 2024 – your candidates

11 Jun

Nominations for the parliamentary election have closed and the full list of candidates has been published. Newham’s two previously oversized seats have been abolished and replaced with three – one of which crosses the border to include three wards from Tower Hamlets.

East Ham

  • Hillary Briffa, Liberal Democrats
  • Maria Higson, Conservatives
  • Tahir Mirza, Independent
  • Daniel Oxley, Reform UK
  • Rosie Pearce, Green Party
  • Satish Ramadoss, Independent
  • Anand Sundar, Independent
  • Stephen Timms, Labour

Stratford and Bow

  • Nizam Ali, Independent
  • Kane Blackwell, Conservatives
  • Jeff Evans, Reform UK
  • Omar Faruk, Independent
  • Steve Hedley, Independent
  • Joe Hudson-Small, Green Party
  • Halima Khan, Workers Party
  • Uma Kumaran, Labour Party
  • Fiona Lali, Independent
  • Janey Little, Liberal Democrat

West Ham and Beckton

  • James Asser, Labour Party
  • Lois Austin, Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition
  • Emily Bigland, Liberal Democrats
  • Rob Callender, Green Party
  • Georgie David, Reform UK
  • Sophia Naqvi, Newham Independents
  • Holly Ramsey, Conservatives
  • Kayode Shedowo, Chrstian Peoples Alliance

Disclosure: I am a Labour Party member and signed the nomination papers for our candidate in Stratford and Bow.

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Spot the difference – 2022 edition

18 Apr

Mirza and Rahman

Below are a dozen policy statements, six from Conservative mayoral candidate Attic Rahman and six from his independent rival Mehmood Mirza. But can you tell which is which?

  • employ new community patrol officer teams to pursue those who drop litter and issue on the spot fines
  • effective enforcement to deal with flytipping and rubbish on our streets
  • a thorough review of parking across the borough to ensure residents and businesses are not punished
  • meaningful consultation on parking issues
  • abolish the first car MiPermit tax to help meet the cost of living
  • free first car permit for every household
  • more resources for the police to tackle crime and support those who want to live in a peaceful and safe borough
  • bring back our own enforcement team to deal with crime, drugs and prostitution
  • primary school children will receive a free breakfast
  • invest in youth centres and services
  • raise housing standards to support private renters
  • no more council tax increases – freeze council tax for four years

Harder than you would imagine, given Mr Rahman’s professed admiration for Boris Johnson and Mirza’s previous Corbynite affectations.

By coincidence, both are also standing for council in Plashet ward. Neither has a running mate, so their almost identical policy platform means it would make sense for them to campaign together.

UPDATE: I am grateful to Tim Roll-Pickering on Twitter for pointing out that the lack of second Conservative candidate in Plashet last year was down to the Returning Officer rejecting a nomination paper and not informing the party agent when there was time to replace it. A revised Statement of Persons Nominated showed this after a complaint was raised.

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Your 2022 – 2026 councillors… probably

26 Mar

Finally, we have a slate of @newham_labour candidates for the election in May.

Although other parties – and the voters! – will have their say, recent electoral history suggests these will be the 66 councillors filling the benches for the next four years.

Sitting councillors are marked with a * although boundary changes mean some are now standing in a different ward

BECKTON
James Asser*
Rohima Rahman
Tonii Wilson*

BOLEYN
Mohammed Osman Gani
Harvinder Virdee*
Cecilia Welsh

CANNING TOWN NORTH
Rita Chadha
Areeq Chowdhury
Shaban Mohammed*

CANNING TOWN SOUTH
Rohit Dasgupta*
Alan Griffiths*
Belgica Guana*

CUSTOM HOUSE
James Beckles*
Thelma Odoi
Sarah Ruiz*

EAST HAM
Olufemi Falola
Haque Imamul
Shantu Ferdous

EAST HAM SOUTH
Mussawar Alam
Susan Masters*
Lakmini Shah*

FOREST GATE NORTH
Rachel Tripp*
Sasha Das Gupta*

FOREST GATE SOUTH
Anamul Islam*
Madeleine Sarley Pontin
Winston Vaughan*

GREEN STREET EAST
Larisa Kilickaja
Miraj Patel
Mohammed Muzibar Rahman*

GREEN STREET WEST
Lewis Godfrey
Mumtaz Khan*
Amar Virdee

LITTLE ILFORD
Elizabeth Booker
Nur Nahar Begum
Abul Bashar Syed

MANOR PARK
Jennifer Bailey*
Mariam Dawood*
Salim Patel*

MARYLAND
Caroline Corben 
Ken Penton 

PLAISTOW NORTH
Zulfiqar Ali*
Joy Laguda*
Daniel Lee-Phakoe*

PLAISTOW SOUTH
Carleene Lee-Phakoe*
Jane Lofthouse*
Neil Wilson*

PLAISTOW WEST & CANNING TOWN EAST
Dina Hossain 
John Morris
Simon Rush

PLASHET
Zuber Gulamussen*
Pushpa Makwana*

ROYAL ALBERT
Ann Easter*
Anthony McAlmont*

ROYAL VICTORIA
Caroline Adaja
Stephen Brayshaw*

STRATFORD
Joshua Garfield*
Sabia Kamali
Terry Paul*

STRATFORD OLYMPIC PARK
Nareser Osei*
Muhammad Ravat

WALL END
Luke Charters
Lester Hudson*
Jemima McAlmont

WEST HAM
John Gray*
Charlene McLean*
John Whitworth*

Congratulations to all those selected and commiserations to those who applied but were unsuccessful. 

UPDATE: the original version of this post listed Aisha Siddiquah, a sitting councillor, as candidate in East Ham and Alison Davenport, a new candidate, in Canning Town North. Cllr Siddiquah decided not to accept the nomination and was replaced by Shantu Ferdous. Ms Davenport’s nomination did not proceed and she was replaced by Areeq Chowdhury.

Now is the letter of our discontent

17 Dec

Five of the six declared applicants to be the next Labour candidate for Mayor of Newham have co-signed a letter calling for the NEC to let local party members have a say in the selection.

VERY URGENT

15 December 2021

The Party Leader,

The General Secretary

And

The NEC Members

Labour Party UK

Newham Mayoral candidate Selection Process for May 2022

We, the undersigned applicants for Labour candidate for Mayor of Newham, request the Party Leader, the General Secretary, and the NEC members of the Labour Party to open the Newham Mayoral selection process for members via open ballot.

Labour Party members in Newham should be allowed to participate in the ballots to democratically select their final candidate. We understand this may have to be based on 2018 membership
lists as this was found acceptable for the previous Mayoral selection process.

Membership irregularities of course have to be investigated but it is vitally important that the process has legitimacy, transparency and credibility in the eyes of the Newham public given the powers of the elected Mayor who they will be electing . This can be achieved whilst addressing the issue of membership irregularities via the alternative we suggest.

We also ask you to take into account the recent letter signed and sent by East Ham MP Stephen Timms and GLA member Unmesh Desai asking for the local membership to be given some say in how their representatives are selected

Yours sincerely,

Canidates (sic) to have declared intention to stand so far

The letter is then signed (if crudely cutting and pasting images of signatures can be called signing) by Ayesha Chowdhury, Unmesh Desai, Lester Hudson, Lakmini Shah and Syed Taqi Jawad Naqvi. There’s a space for Rokhsana Fiaz’s signature, but it is of course blank.

Is this a principled call for democratic involvement, or a cynical ploy to play up to certain elements within the local party? For sure, the five signatories know they have little chance of winning the selection if it’s left up to the NEC. Barring some outrageous scandal, the party simply isn’t going to ditch a BAME woman as candidate. So calling for an open vote makes tactical sense.

But, as the letter acknowledges, the two CLPS in Newham have been suspended for ‘membership irregularities’. The party has no confidence that current lists are accurate and there may be dozens – possibly hundreds – of fake members on the books. The solution suggested in the letter is to go back to 2018 and use those lists.

Why 2018? Well, that was when Rokhsana Fiaz was selected and if it was good enough then it should be good enough now, right?

Well, no. The idea of using old membership lists is problematic, for a number of reasons. Firstly, does the party have an accurate list of who was a member in Newham in 2018 or could it realistically re-create one? Even if it does (or could) a significant number of people will have left the party (voluntarily or otherwise) or moved out of the area in the meantime. So the NEC would have to remove them from the franchise, unless the candidates think people who are no longer members or don’t live in Newham now should be given a vote!

Secondly, what date in 2018 do you choose for the freeze date – the 1st of January, the 31st of December, or any of the 363 days in between? (I should declare an interest here, as I re-joined the party in March 2018 – should I get a vote or not?)

But the biggest problem is that going back to 2018 doesn’t ‘address the issue of membership irregularities’ at all. They did not suddenly spring up out of nowhere in 2021 – the likelihood is that they have been going on for years. And the NEC needs to take the time to address them properly, not in some half-arsed rush.

Of course Labour members should get a say in who their candidates are. But they are not being denied that in Newham because of an authoritarian NEC diktat but because of significant misbehaviour, which needs to be investigated and rooted out.

All of the five signatories of this letter are longstanding councillors or CLP officers. They of all people should want the problems sorted properly.

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How Newham voted (part 3)

7 Jun

This time it’s the city-wide list vote. Across the borough as a whole Labour took 55.8%, the Tories 20%, the Greens 7.6% and the Liberal Democrats 3.5%.

Below is how the vote broke down between the four main parties in each ward (and among postal voters)…

WardLabourCons GreenLib Dems Others
Newham Postal Vote52.7%19.5%6.8%4.3%15.6%
Beckton48.1%22.7%7.3%3.4%15.6%
Boleyn57.4%19.4%5.8%2.8%10.6%
Canning Town North51.4%21.4%6.0%2.8%14.8%
Canning Town South46.3%22.2%8.9%4.2%15.5%
Custom House47.8%24.0%5.9%2.9%16.3%
East Ham Central55.3%22.9%5.1%2.5%9.0%
East Ham North61.1%20.1%3.6%1.6%9.3%
East Ham South54.4%21.5%5.3%2.7%11.9%
Forest Gate North51.4%13.5%15.3%3.1%13.8%
Forest Gate South57.0%14.7%9.8%2.8%12.9%
Green Street East59.8%19.8%4.0%1.8%9.0%
Green Street West58.7%21.2%4.9%2.0%8.5%
Little Ilford62.8%18.1%4.3%2.0%8.7%
Manor Park56.1%19.3%6.7%1.8%12.1%
Plaistow North57.3%18.1%7.0%2.2%11.4%
Plaistow South51.4%21.6%6.9%3.4%13.1%
Royal Docks47.8%20.0%10.5%5.8%13.6%
Stratford & New Town50.8%14.3%14.0%6.8%11.9%
Wall End61.6%19.5%4.1%1.8%8.9%
West Ham51.6%18.2%10.3%3.3%12.8%

Despite Little Ilford scoring the biggest pro-Conservative swing in the whole of London in the mayoral election it returned Labour’s best vote share in the Assembly list. The party exceeded 50% in 16 of the 20 wards and among postal voters.

The Conservatives placed second in 19 wards, with Forest Gate North being the exception. This was also the ward with the lowest Tory vote share – 13.5%. Their best result was Custom House, with 24%. As I noted in a previous post, Shaun Bailey ‘won’ Custom House in the mayoral election, so this is clearly a target ward for them (though the ward boundaries will be somewhat different for next year’s council election).

The Greens did best in Forest Gate North, taking second place with 15.3%. They also exceeded 10% in Stratford, Royal Docks and West Ham.

If the Liberal Democrats were looking for a good showing in their target wards in the north of the borough – they have hopes for the new Olympic Park ward – this will have been a disappointment. Although Stratford & New Town was their best result they still finished in fourth place with less than half the Green share of the vote.

We’re voting for change

21 Apr

Just vague enough not to cause trouble

26 Jul

West Ham MP Lyn Brown spoke in yesterday’s Summer adjournment debate in the House of Commons, accusing the government of Brexit-induced cowardice in the face of human rights abuses around the world:

I usually use this debate to talk about very local issues. Today I want to deviate a little, because many of my constituents have written to me about their concerns for people who live elsewhere in the world and their fear that our voice might be silenced or muted because of Brexit and our pursuit of trade deals.

My constituents have pointed out Trump’s obsession with walls and putting children in cages, and his insidious support for the damaging and highly dangerous great replacement conspiracy theory. They asked, “What did we do in response?” Well, we gave him a state visit.

There are concerns about other powerful countries too, like China. As we know, more than a million men, women and children are in detention camps, based on their ethnicity and their Muslim faith. Families have been torn apart by the state, children from their parents. Credible reports say that detainees are forced to swear oaths of allegiance, renounce their religion and learn Mandarin in place of their mother tongue. Some reports even talk of summary execution and the harvesting of organs.

Our Government has recognised that human rights abuses are happening today on a huge, almost unimaginable scale. Uyghur Muslims fear a genocide. Why have we not taken targeted steps? Frankly, we do not need more words. It is clearly a business. We could identify those who develop racist software to identify the targets. We could identify those who are building the camps. We could refuse them contracts with the UK, couldn’t we? We could speak up much more strongly about Hong Kong as well, couldn’t we? We could address the increasing fear of Hong Kongers that their free society is just slipping away. We could help—but we have not, and I fear that we will not because China might move away from freer trade, and we need that free trade now as a substitute for what we are losing.

I fear that it is the same with Modi’s Government.

On 17 June, when the new Indian Parliament was being sworn in, members of the ruling party chanted the Hindu nationalist slogan “Jai Sri Ram” whenever a Muslim representative stood up to take their oath. It was an attempt to intimidate and delegitimise those elected representatives based on their religion. Those words could simply be an expression of faith, but they have been twisted into something horrifying.

Since then, there have been repeated Islamophobic attacks, accompanied by that same chant. On 22 June, Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole, beaten and abused by a crowd in the open. He cried and begged for mercy. After the crowd were done with Tabrez—after they had forced him to repeat their slogan and taken yet another step to erase his difference—the police took him into custody. Reportedly, he was refused medical help. His family members were threatened with similar beatings and not permitted even to see him until, four days later, he died of his injuries.

There have been many further attacks. A Hindu video is being shared, with the lyric:

“Whoever doesn’t say Jai Sri Ram, send him to the graveyard.”

Frankly, that is the language of genocide.

As hon. Members will know, I could go on. I wanted to talk about Bolsonaro’s Brazil, Saudi Arabia and our arms deals as well. To be entirely honest, it seems to me that FCO Ministers, many of whom I deeply respect, have raised human rights issues in terms just vague enough not to cause trouble.

What is our role in this new world if we swallow our words and turn away when we see persecution escalating, risk to lives and liberty, and possible genocide on the horizon? How will this new Government show us that they are not cowards, they are not distracted and they are not restricted because of Brexit?

Lobby the council

17 Jun

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From the Stratford and New Town Labour Party Facebook page (inline links added):

We encourage all ward members to read

the cabinet paper (PDF)

that has been put forward proposing a Public Space Protection Order which could see Stratford Centre closed and rough sleeping criminalised within the Centre and the areas around it.

This is a major issue for ward members and Stratford and New Town Branch Labour party will be discussing the issues around this as a matter of urgency, either at our next ward meeting on the 4th July or if necessary at a special ward meeting, depending on the timetable for consultation.

There are serious human rights issues with Public Space Protection Orders and Liberty have campaigned against the use of these by local authorities. We are also concerned about the criminalisation of vulnerable people and limiting access to the Centre, which is a public thoroughfare, for Stratford residents.

A lobby of the council is planned for tomorrow evening, details [in the image above]

The cabinet paper, linked above, sets out the problem – from the council’s perspective – with crime and disorder arising from an increase in rough sleeping in the shopping centre. It also

outlines the current support and action being taken to provide tailored support to vulnerable individuals. The report details the outreach and support work that is undertaken and any temporary provision that will be put in place pending the availability of a more permanent solution.

Criminalising the poor and vulnerable was a policy vigorously pursued by the previous regime, which issued ASBOs to rough sleepers around Stratford. It would be a shame (to put it mildly) if the new administration went down the same road.

Update (Monday 17 June, 20:10)

The Mayor has just announced at full council that the report on Street Homelessness in Stratford proposed for Cabinet tomorrow has been withdrawn.

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East Ham gets the go-ahead

14 Jun

SyedTaqiShah1 2019 Jun 06

East Ham chair Tahir Mirza and secretary Syed Taqi Shah with Peterborough candidate Lisa Forbes

After several years in the doldrums East Ham CLP finally got itself back on its feet earlier this year. Branch AGMs were held, general committee (GC) delegates elected and a CLP meeting elected a new slate of officers in February.

Since when nothing much has happened. There hasn’t been a GC meeting and members have been left wondering what’s going on.

But there is good news – the investigation by London regional office to ensure all the elected GC delegates were legitimate has been completed. It was delayed for several months by staff being deployed to the local elections, the European elections and then the Peterborough by-election, but an approved list of delegates has now been sent to the East Ham secretary. So the CLP can get on and hold meetings.

The first will be a special trigger ballot meeting on City and East London Assembly member Unmesh Desai next Thursday (20 June).

East Ham’s trigger meeting is the last in City and East. So far Unmesh Desai has won five and lost one, in West Ham. This means he has already passed the threshold to be automatically re-selected as the Labour candidate in 2020. 

The ‘regular’ GC will follow on, including an election for party conference delegates. Nominations have to be submitted by 5pm on the day and, given that most branches won’t meet before the GC, it’s hard to see how they can put forward valid nominations.

No doubt London region will be keeping an eye on things.

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